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“He’s going to drown,” said Dooley.

“Better get ready to call for help,” I said.

Brutus put one paw into the pond, then the next, and soon he was up to his chest in the murky water. A nearby frog gave him a weird look, then hopped off. Probably to get his buddies. This they had to see.

“See?” Brutus shouted to the ducks. “I’m a real duck! I can swim!”

He must have stepped into a hole, though, for suddenly he disappeared, only to return spluttering and sputtering above the surface.

“Help!” he screamed. “I can’t swim!”

“I knew it,” said Dooley. “Are you going to save him or am I?”

Only trouble was, neither of us could swim either.

Meanwhile Brutus was going under for the third time…

Chapter 9

Chase, who was interviewing witnesses, suddenly found his attention snagged by a disturbance taking place near the duck pond. A frown marred his handsome and exceedingly masculine face, and he looked over. The sight that met his eyes surprised him, to say the least. Two cats were seated on the side of the pond, mewling at the top of their lungs. Meanwhile a third cat had stumbled into the water and was in a situation of clear and present danger. Chase, who instantly recognized the cats as—reading from left to right—Max, Dooley and Brutus, wasted no time pondering hows and whys, immediately dropped his notebook, and broke into a 100-meter dash that would have made Usain Bolt proud.

Without a second’s hesitation, he jumped headfirst into the pond and disappeared beneath the water’s surface. With a few powerful strokes of his arms he reached the spot where he’d last seen Brutus, and then he was diving down into the murky depths. This was Odelia’s cat, and if it drowned she’d be devastated. He could not allow that to happen.

He opened his eyes and frantically searched about. But apart from a few reeds and other dwellers of the deep, he saw no sign of a black cat. He rose to the surface, took a big deep gulp of breath, then went under again, this time scanning closer to the edge of the pond. And then he saw the little bugger: Brutus was floating near the sandy bottom.

He grabbed the poor animal and pushed himself off towards the surface, holding him up like that weird painted monkey holding up the lion cub inThe Lion King. Elton John didn’t break into song when he finally emerged, but Max and Dooley did. Or at least they broke into jubilant praise.

Chase carefully placed Brutus on the bank of the pond and to his elation the black cat, who now looked more like a drowned rat than his usual debonair self, coughed up about a gallon of water, then piteously meowed something only cats were equipped to understand. His two little friends were still meowing up a storm, and not for the first time Chase found himself thinking how great it would be if he could actually understand them.

Odelia, who must have been alerted to the drama that was unfolding, came running.“Oh, my sweet, sweet Brutus!” she cried, concern lacing her voice. “What happened?”

“Beats me,” said Chase. “I guess he accidentally fell into the water.”

To his surprise, her words apparently hadn’t been directed at him but at Max and Dooley, who meowed something in response.

Weird. Almost as if they could understand what she was talking about.

Onlookers had arrived, and were all rubbernecking to their heart’s content. It wasn’t murder this time but a cat in peril but that didn’t stop them from taking out their damn smartphones and filming the heck out of the scene.

Chase ground his teeth.“Put those phones away!” he bellowed, getting up.

He hated this habit of people to film any disaster scene they encountered. Used to be that people actually showed up at the scene of an accident to help out. Now they just wanted to film the whole thing so they could post it on their social media.

“I swear to God,” he grumbled. “I’m going to bust some heads.”

But Odelia’s slender fingers enveloped his bicep and she said, “Thank you so much, Chase. You’re my hero.”

His anger melted like snow before a blistering sun and when she hugged him to show her gratitude, his mind went momentarily blank. When she pulled back, he said,“Oh, Christ. I’ve made you all wet.” Her blouse, her jeans… She was almost as soaking wet as he was.

“I don’t mind,” she said, a smile lighting up her face.

He knew those cats of hers meant the world to her, and he was glad he’d been there to save Brutus. If he’d been even one minute late in responding…

Oddly enough, a small flock of ducks now came floating up, quacking softly. They waddled onto the shore and approached Brutus, first hesitantly, then with more gusto. And then the weirdest thing happened: the ducks quacked, and Brutus meowed. Almost as if they were communicating! Crazy, of course, but then such was life down here in Hampton Cove. As close to a regular Garden of Eden as humanly possible, complete with talking animals. He shook off the thought. Murder and mayhem didn’t happen in the Garden of Eden, but they sure happened in this adopted town of his too often to be dismissed.